


Of T-shirts and Lab Safety

by DarkWolfMoon



Category: Iron Man (Movies), Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Gen, Humor, Post-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), T-Shirts, lab safety
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-17
Updated: 2018-12-17
Packaged: 2019-09-21 12:28:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,209
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17043746
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DarkWolfMoon/pseuds/DarkWolfMoon
Summary: Tony is waiting for Peter in the lab at the Compound. When the kid arrives, he can't help but find the kid's shirt kind of ironic.





	Of T-shirts and Lab Safety

**Author's Note:**

> This story was spawned by a t-shirt described in an Ouran High School Host Club fic. My immediate thought, because I have fallen down the deep hole of MCU fics, was that Peter would totally own this shirt and wear it unironically, until the universe made it as ironic as possible. And then Tony would see it.

For Tony, it seemed like a normal day in the lab at the Compound, and technically it was. It was easy to fall into the routine of programming and fabricating new prosthetics and braces. Part of the process was old hat, but it was busy work while he was waiting for Happy to arrive with Peter from school.

He didn't want to think about everything that had happened after the snap, how Thanos had won, however briefly. Every time he closed his eyes, he saw Peter collapsing into dust in his arms, apologizing for something that wasn't his fault. Part of him couldn't help but wonder if the kid still would have disappeared if he hadn't been there, if he had been safe on Earth. He didn't have an answer for that, but it didn't stop him from thinking.

All that really mattered was that they won and he had Peter back. Everyone who had disappeared in the snap was back, like they had managed to do a complete Ctrl+Z on Thanos' big plan. It was wonderful to be back, to be alive and to have everything back to some semblance of normal, but the world had changed, as had the people in it.

Bruce was back, which was nice, and he was more comfortable with himself. He even had the attentions of a lovely Asgardian woman, a Valkyrie, according to Thor. Having Thor back was also good, too, but he was spending a lot more time settling the remnants of the Asgardian people on a nearby planet. Rogers was back on site, as were the rest of the Rogues. It was... harder than he expected it to be. He had known on some level that some things couldn't go back to the way they were before. But then, he didn't really want them to, not anymore. He had wanted them back in the beginning, after everything had gone to hell in a handbasket and he was left in a deactivated suit of armor in an abandoned base in Siberia. But now he was tired and he had moved on. They were there, they were part of the Avengers again, but he couldn't put in the effort to be one of them the way he'd been able to for years before the Civil War between them happened.

Besides, he had other people now.

As if on cue, Peter walked into the lab. "Hey, Mr. Stark."

"Hey, kid," Tony greeted without looking up. "What's the project you were going to work on today?"

"I've been trying out different combinations of web fluid, ones that will last longer or conduct electricity, things like that."

Tony nodded. "Well, if it's chemicals you're going to be working with, you know the deal. Lab coat, goggles—the whole nine yards."

"Yes, Mr. Stark."

"I heard you rolling your eyes at me." Tony happened to look up as Peter shucked off his coat and laid it on the arm of the couch, hanging over his back pack. As the kid turned around, he glanced down at Peter's shirt, looking for the science pun of the day.

He had to do a double take after he read it.

"Don't you think it's a little late for that?" He asked. "Or are you getting a little greedy?"

"A little late for what?" Peter asked, confused.

Tony gestured at his shirt. It was adorable really. It depicted a man in a lab coat pouring the contents of two test tubes on himself. Below the image read: _Forget lab safety, I want superpowers!_ What was more adorable was the lovely shade of pink Peter was turning.

"I, uh, I forgot this was the shirt I put on this morning."

Tony snorted. "Well, you're in my lab, and you and I both know what your aunt will do to me if you get hurt here, so there will be no forgetting lab safety in here."

"I won't," Peter promised.

There went about their projects for a while, Peter in his lab coat, goggles, and a pair of gloves. Tony kept an eye on him because, joke or not, a sort of lab accident was how he'd gotten his powers and the kid was accident prone to the extreme. After a while, when Peter had progressed onto testing the webs with a special set of web shooters kept in there for lab use, Tony wandered over.

"So, where can I get one of those shirts?" he asked.

Peter looked up at him. "You want one of these?"

"Yes. Or, rather, I want to get one for someone else." Tony felt the mischievous look that slowly crept onto his face. He didn't regret anything in the slightest. Especially because he hadn't done anything yet. "In fact, I think you should be there when I give it to him."

"To who?"

"Ah-ah-ah, spiderling. You'll find out later. Now spill. Where did you get the shirt?"

Peter shrugged. "I just found it online. I thought it was funny then. This was before anything actually happened."

A thought occurred to Tony. "For the love of god, if you were wearing that the day you were bitten, I may just have to have a priest come and exorcise it because I don't want you running anything else like that!" He paused. "And if you get any more shirts that tempt fate, let me know so I can update the Baby Monitor protocol."

"Mr. Stark!"

"Nuh-uh, no fighting me on this. You have a bad habit of getting into the sort of trouble that does this sort of thing," he cut in, gesturing vaguely at the shirt. "If you are going to go about tempting Murphy's Law, I'm going to make sure there's something in place to deal with the consequences."

Grumbling indistinctly, the kid turned back to his work while Tony had FRIDAY order two shirts, one in large of the same variety as Peter's, and the other in a custom size with a slightly altered message. He smiled, utterly pleased with himself and not afraid of anyone noticing it.

* * *

Three days later, Peter was back at the Compound and the shirts had arrived. As soon as the kid stepped into the lab, Tony took note of the shirt of the day: _I make horrible science puns, but only periodically._

"There is nothing periodic about your puns, kid," Tony remarked, tossing a small wrapped package at him.

Peter caught it. "Is this for me?"

"No. We're going to take a little field trip, and you're going to give that to the person we meet at the end of it."

"Oh. Who's it for?"

"You'll find out."

Realization dawned on Peter's face. "Is this the shirt?"

"It's one of them."

The kid shot him a suspicious look, rightfully caught off guard by the wording of his response. Tony just grinned and grabbed another, thicker package before surreptitiously grabbing another and slipping it under his arm. They wandered down the hall to the elevator and FRIDAY took them down three floors to the basement lab space.

It had occurred to Tony that, although they had been working in the same building for a few months now, Peter had never met Bruce. Today, he was going to rectify that. He knew the kid knew a lot about him. He'd mentioned studying him in some of his science classes, reading papers he'd written on the effects of gamma radiation, especially after the bite that gave him his powers. But for all that, Tony had never gotten around to putting the two of them in the same room.

The elevator doors slipped open and Bruce looked up.

"Hey, Tony," he greeted, then a look of confusion came across his face as he caught sight of Peter. "What's going on?"

Without replying, Tony nudged the kid and he stumbled forward. "Go on," he told him. "Give it to him."

"You're Dr. Bruce Banner," Peter whispered in that tone of awe he usually reserved for Tony. He straightened and held out the package. "Mr. Stark wanted me to give this to you."

"Thank you." Bruce looked a little lost, which had Tony cackling inside, but he took the package. "Um, who are you?"

"Oh, I'm Peter. Peter Parker. I'm, uh, I'm Mr. Stark's intern."

"Among other things," Tony added, shrugging.

Bruce blinked, looking between them. "Wait. Is this your kid?"

"What?" he and Peter asked in unison.

"Clint was saying something about you having a kid the other day. Is this him?"

Tony turned to Peter. "Remind me to spray the vents down with jalapeno oil." He turned back to Bruce. "Biologically speaking, I had nothing to do with this," he said, jerking a thumb in the kid's direction. "But I have been trying to take care of him, so I can see where Birdbrain got the wrong idea." He waved a hand, dismissing the conversation as if it was a bit of smoke hanging in the air in front of him. "That's not why we're here though. Open that one first. Then this one." He set the other package down on the desk next to Bruce's cold cup of tea.

Peter glanced up at him, a look of poorly concealed amusement in his eyes. Apparently the kid got the joke. Now Banner had to get in on it.

Bruce looked between them suspiciously, then sighed and started to open the package. "It's a shirt," he observed dully as it dropped into his lap. He picked it up to see the design, then dropped his hands to look at them again. " _Tony_."

In that one word, Bruce had managed to cram a lot of exasperation, amusement, and disbelief. Beside him, Peter started snickering, which quickly turned into an uncontrollable giggle. He had to lean against the counter to stop himself from collapsing to the floor.

"The kid was wearing one the other day," Tony offered by way of explanation. "I figured you would at least get a kick out of it." He tapped the desk beside the other package. "Now open the other one."

Peter managed to control the giggle fit enough to pay attention as Bruce started opening the other one. As before, a green shirt tumbled into his lap, one that was much larger than anything Bruce had ever worn.

"Tell me you didn't," Banner muttered, even as he lifted it up to see the design.

Beside Tony, Peter choked as the laughter returned, harder than before. The shirt, instead of a man in a lab coat pouring the contents of test tubes on himself, had an image of a man who had just shredded his lab coat with wonderfully defined muscles, his tie still hanging loosely off his neck. Below the image, the letter 'o' was replaced with the radiation symbol and the message read: _Forgot lab safety, now I have superpowers._

"Please tell me you didn't—"

"Wish I could, Brucie bear, but you're holding the evidence right now. It would be pointless to deny it." Tony grinned openly at him, thoroughly satisfied with the outcome.

"How do you even have the Hulk's size?"

Peter gave up all sense of dignity and collapsed to the floor, still laughing. Every time it seemed to be petering out, he'd open his eyes, see the shirt again, and start laughing anew.

"Eh, there's all kinds of footage of the Hulk out there, and I had FRIDAY analyze it to get his approximate size, then we went a little bit bigger, just in case." Tony glanced down at the giggling teenager. "If you think that's funny, here."

He tossed Peter the other package he'd had tucked under his arm. The kid caught it and ripped it open, almost in one move. His was a red shirt, with a person in a lab coat wearing the Spider-man mask. The text beneath it was also subtly different. It read: _Someone forgot lab safety, and now I have superpowers._ Like Hulk's shirt, every one of the 'o's was filled with the Spider-man symbol.

Peter snorted, but managed to avoid the crippling laughter again. "You realize I can only ever wear this here, right?"

"Yeah, I know. But now it's part of your lab equipment." Tony's grin widened at the series of expressions that flickered across the kid's face, everything from annoyance to mirth.

"So you're Spider-man then?" Bruce asked. "Nice to meet you."

Peter held out his hand to shake. "Yeah, nice to meet you, too. I've read up on your papers on radio-physics and anti-electron collision."

"And you understood it?"

"Yeah, most of it. I do have a few questions..."

Tony smiled to himself. This was going to be fun, a trifecta of unholy science now that they were all introduced. He would need to find an appropriate shirt of his own.

* * *

Two days later, Tony was wearing a shirt that read: _They said I could be anything, so I became IRON MAN!_ He was happy with it, and it had everything to do with the way Peter laughed every time he saw it.

And if the picture of the three of them wearing their shirts ended up as the background on his phone, well, he was the only one who needed to know that.


End file.
